


Close to the Vest

by KatieComma



Series: Uncle Steve Ficlets [4]
Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: Grace is such a McDanno shipper, M/M, Pre-Relationship, Pre-Slash, Sexual Tension, Sorry Not Sorry, UST, Unresolved Sexual Tension, mcdanno, uncle steve
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-14
Updated: 2018-11-14
Packaged: 2019-08-23 12:30:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,555
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16619000
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KatieComma/pseuds/KatieComma
Summary: Steve is teaching Grace how to fight. Of course Danny disapproves of the method.





	Close to the Vest

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you lavendersblues for helping me finish this up!!! You're a gem and a wonderful beta reader!

It’s pouring buckets, and Steve’s left the garage door open a crack for airflow and light, despite the weather.

Grace is taking jabs at the punching bag hung up in the middle of the room. Charlie’s sitting crosslegged in the corner, a toy car in each hand, but his eyes are fixed on his big sister.

“Alright Gracie,” Steve instructs, “give me the jab again. Don’t drop your shoulder. Keep the shoulder up.”

Grace jabs hard at the bag, obeying Steve as best she can and keeping her shoulder raised, eyes intent on her target.

Steve stands behind the bag, holding it so he can feel how she’s connecting. Each punch is getting harder and harder with the confidence she builds. If he’d taught her how to fight sooner, he would have been able to crouch and brace his hands lower on the bag. But she's getting tall, not like her father, and Steve stands straight and tall, hands holding at chest height. When had she gotten so big? When had she been allowed to grow up?

Steve steps away from the bag to demonstrate. “You don’t want to push the bag, right? You want to make contact and then pull it back.” Steve demonstrates slow, bringing his fist out to meet the bag, tap it and return to the defensive position. “It’s not about pushing the bag. It’s about making contact and returning.” Now for dramatic effect he does a few at full speed. “See? The bag barely moves.” He steps back behind the bag. “Try again.”

Grace squares up, makes sure her feet are in the right place, and lets loose her jabs.

“Make sure to pull it all the way back before you jab again,” Steve continues to toss out advice. Once she’s got a handle on something, he gives her a little more to tweak and help her tighten things up without overwhelming her all at once. “It’s gonna be too weak if you don’t pull it back all the way.”

“Can I have a word with you?” Danny’s voice interrupts the soft thumps of Grace’s punches.

“Who, me?” Steve asks, still watching Grace’s form.

“Yeah, you,” Danny’s annoyed, Steve can hear it in his tone. But when isn’t Danny annoyed?

“Alright Grace, you just keep it up. And remember, if the bag moves it’s too hard, bring it back in, ok?” Steve asks.

“You got it Uncle Steve,” she replies enthusiastically before she turns back to the bag.

Steve follows Danny into the house, but keeps watching Grace. “And don’t drop that shoulder!” He calls back before Danny closes the door to the garage.

“What are you doing?” Danny asks, motioning toward the garage they just vacated.

Steve does his best to look confused, it’s the surefire way to piss Danny off quick. And pissing Danny off quick is the best way to end a fight quick. Otherwise he’ll dance around and around the topic before getting to the point.

“What does it look like I’m doing?” Steve asks. “You said I could teach Gracie to defend herself.”

“Yes, to defend herself. I thought you were gonna tell her to kick the guy in the nuts and run away,” Danny says, starting to wave his hands around. Definitely a bad sign. “Not turn her into the next Ronda Rousey here.”

Steve smiles. “I know, she’s doin’ good right?”

Danny huffs and turns away. This is gonna be a good one.

“Come on Danny, what did you think I was gonna teach her?” Steve asks. “They didn’t exactly teach us to ‘kick him in the balls and run away’ at the Naval Academy.”

“Uncle Steve!” Grace calls from the garage. “I think I got it!”

“Oh great!” Danny throws his hands up. “She thinks she’s got it! What, has she got Charlie in a sleeper hold now?”

Steve keeps his face as serious as he’s able. “No, I was saving the sleeper hold for this afternoon.” Steve lets a smile slip across his face. “Come on, she’s a young girl. You don’t want her to be able to defend herself?”

“Defend herself sure, but you’re in here teaching her to be the next featherweight champ,” Danny argues. “Teach her to kick the guy in the nuts and run away. That’s all you gotta do!"

“How is it that everything makes you mad?” Steve asks.

“Not everything makes me mad Steven, just you. And how is it that you manage to turn everything around on me?” Danny asks. “This isn’t my fault.”

“Fault?” Steve asks. “What fault? There’s no fault here. Nothing’s wrong. See, you’re finding problems where there aren’t any.”

“Uncle Steve?” Grace calls again.

Steve opens the door and walks away from Danny. “Alright Gracie, let’s see it.”

She executes several perfect jabs, tapping the bag, shoulder up, pulling all the way back.

“I think I’ve got it!” She’s so excited and Steve can’t help but smile.

“Yeah I think you do kiddo,” he says.

Danny huffs out his frustration behind Steve, and sits down with Charlie in the corner. His voice changes completely, the frustration leaking away when he talks to his son. “Whaddya got there buddy? Is that a police car?” Steve remembers well the very first day they worked together and Danny took a call from Grace, his voice transformed in exactly the same way, to a ray of sunshine in an otherwise cloudy life.

“Alright, alright,” Steve says, “that’s enough for today Gracie. But before you go, can you show Danno what I taught you earlier?” Steve turns to Danny to see a twinkle of fear in his bright blue eyes.

“Let’s do it!” Grace says.

“You remember what I taught you?” Steve asks.

Grace just nods, a fierce look in her eyes, the look she got from her father. “You watching dad?” She asks.

“Yeah monkey, I’m watching,” Danny says, and he sounds so tired. Why does he let the world weigh so heavily on him all the time?

Steve nods at Grace before he reaches out with his hand and grabs her little wrist. It hurts him to think that this might be something that could happen to her one day, but at least now she knows what to do.

Remembering perfectly, Grace spins in his grip, forces his arm upward and to the side where she breaks his hold on her frail tiny wrist and puts a hand on his shoulder to force him over, bending him in two. Then using her arms on his shoulder for leverage she brings her knee up and stops just short of kneeing him in a very sensitive area. She lets Steve go, and bows dramatically like she’s just finished one of her adorable grade school performances. Steve misses those days and wishes she hadn’t grown up so quickly when he wasn’t watching.

Steve turns around to see the look of joy on Danny’s face. One of those smiles that changes his face entirely into something happy and carefree. Steve loves being responsible for his partner forgetting the weight of the world for a while. Danny and Charlie clap while Grace continues to bow.

“Monkey!” Danny says. “You just beat up a Navy SEAL! I’ve never been so proud in my whole life.” Danny jumps up from his seat in the corner and pulls Grace up into a hug, cradling her head, and swinging her around, feet off the ground. He stops twirling so he can see Steve’s face and meets his eye. He shoots his partner a wink and mouths “thank you.” 

Steve makes a face that he knows Danny will interpret as “no problem, of course,” and waves away the gratitude.

Danny sets Grace back down and she all but jumps out of his arms. “You try Danno! It’s really easy.”

“Yeah Danno,” Steve puts on a cocky smile. “Really easy.”

Danny glares at him.

“Come on Danno,” Grace urges, pushing him toward the centre of the garage. Toward Steve.

“Alright, alright,” Danny grudgingly agrees. “What do I gotta do?” He unbuttons his shirt sleeves, and rolls them up to the elbow, strong forearms on full display. Steve tries not to think about the fact that he knows exactly how the skin and hair on those arms feels under his fingertips.

“It’s easy,” Steve says, stepping closer to Danny. “Grab my wrist.” He holds out his right hand.

Grace retreats to the corner to sit with Charlie.

“Grab your wrist?” Danny asks sceptically.

“What did I just say?” Steve rolls his eyes. “Yeah, grab my wrist.”

Danny reaches out his hand to close his fingers around Steve’s wrist. “Alrig-” Before Danny even finishes the word Steve has him bent in two, his arm locked, uncomfortable pressure pushing down on the elbow joint. Steve leaves off the kicking him in the junk portion of the exercise.

It’s the same position Steve put Danny in on the day they met. Danny had pointed a finger into his chest and yelled in his face, and after one warning Steve had twisted his partner into the same prone position to prove a point.

“See Danno,” Steve mocks, “easy.”

The fabric of Danny’s shirt is stretched tight over his back, and Steve watches the muscles bunch there, knowing well the strength coiled under the thin fabric. He can tell that Danny wants to resist the hold, but knows that if he does it will just hurt, so he stays there at Steve’s mercy, waiting.

“When you let me up I’m gonna punch you again,” Danny says, but he’s mostly joking. Steve knows that if he holds it for too long Danny will make good on that promise.

“Glad you remembered this one,” Steve says, letting the pressure off so his partner can straighten up.

“You’ve taught my dad this before?” Grace asks from the corner.

“Not exactly,” Danny says, at the same time Steve answers: “I did teach him a lesson.”

Danny glares at Steve, who just rolls his eyes.

“Alright let’s do it slow so I can show you,” Steve says, beckoning Danny back toward him.

Danny doesn’t even hesitate, and grabs Steve’s wrist without being instructed to. So much trust in each other. Such a change from that first day when they’d met and immediately gotten in each other’s faces.

Doing the move slow is going to kill Steve, he can feel it. Warm fingers wrapped around his wrist, holding tight at his pulse point. Strong hands that he’s seen do a million other things: deal cards at poker night, or stir homemade marinara, or deftly replace the clip of a gun. He closes his eyes for a second and swallows hard, but his mouth is dry and there’s not much to swallow.

“Well?” Danny prompts.

“Sorry,” Steve replies. “Muscle memory. It’s easy to do fast, but when you have to stop and think about it, it’s like trying to do something backwards.”

“Not so perfect after all,” Danny mumbles under his breath.

Steve demonstrates the move slowly like he did for Grace. Swinging Danny’s arm up and around, breaking the grip over their heads, and forcing him down with the pressure on his elbow. Explaining each movement carefully as demonstrated. Danny concentrates like he’s going to be tested on it later, mouth open a little, tongue out to the left corner the way he does when he’s really focused.

“My turn?” Danny asks, too eagerly, when Steve’s done.

“Sure Danno,” Steve smiles. “Give it your best shot.”

Steve reaches out and grips Danny’s wrist. He can feel the heartbeat pulsing under his fingertips, and his own heart starts to race right along with it. He meets Danny’s gaze, and just like everyday, he thinks he sees something deep down in those blue eyes that mirrors his own feelings, but he’s too afraid to find out, too afraid to lose what he already has. The contact under his palm is almost painful, and he just wants Danny to make his move already.

Steve makes the first two easy, offering no resistance as Danny gets the hang of the movements. Having fought and defended himself a lot, Danny gets into the swing pretty easily. So on the third one, Steve starts to offer resistance. On the fourth one, Steve wonders why they’re still doing this when Danny obviously has the hang of it, which was the whole point. 

The fifth time he decides to mess with his partner a little. Once Danny has him down, pressure on his elbow joint, Steve spins under and around hoping his flexibility is still what it used to be. His shoulder complains a little as he twists, and thank god Danny wasn’t prepared for it and his grip is loose, because Steve pulls away easily and reverses the whole thing. He pushes Danny up against the wall of the garage, arm twisted tightly behind his back.

Steve stares into Danny’s eyes, holding him there. Danny’s not struggling, just staring right back. They’re so close he can taste Danny’s huffed out breaths in the air between them. Danny isn’t talking. A first… ever. And there’s something fiery building deep in his eyes, but Steve’s not sure if it’s anger or something else. Steve’s heart and stomach are fighting for the rights to crawl up his throat. 

“Woah! You never taught me that one!” Grace squeals from across the room.

Steve lets go of Danny and steps back, almost tripping over his own feet he feels so dizzy with excitement and emotion.

“That’s for the advanced class kiddo. Maybe next time,” Steve chokes out before he turns away to lean against the workbench. Thank god Grace had spoken up. Lost in his own head he’d forgotten the kids were there.

“Oh no,” Danny speaks up again. “There will be no next time. I think we’ve learned quite enough combat from the Super SEAL today. You can defend yourself and that’s all I wanted.”

Steve keeps his back turned. He’s embarrassed, though he doesn’t quite know what for, and he needs to get his heart rate back down but it just won’t obey.

“But Danno!” Grace whines. Even when she’s whining Steve loves her like his own, and her voice brings a smile to his lips.

“Listen to your dad Gracie,” Steve says, finally turning back to the Williams family who are gathering up Charlie’s cars.

“Alright, alright, out to the car,” Danny’s ushering them toward the door. “Let’s get you back to your mother before she calls the police on me.”

“But you _are_ the police Danno,” Charlie is genuinely confused.

“You don’t think Uncle Steve wouldn’t stoop to bringing me in anyway? For the fun of it?” Danny asks.

Steve forces a laugh. “See you guys next time!” He calls out with a wave.

“Next time!” Grace calls out with a not so subtle wink. Now, every time they get together she’s going to try and wrangle more fighting lessons from him, with Danny’s approval or not.

“Bye Uncle Steve!” Charlie calls out enthusiastically.

As soon as he hears the front door close Steve sags against the wall and slides to the floor, head in his hands. 

What a mess. He can’t even lay a hand on Danny without his heart speeding up like he’s running a marathon. But it is a marathon. Day after day, racing past feelings that he’s trying to ignore while focusing on each footstep instead of the end result. Because at the finish line he needs to figure out exactly what to do. Try to forget it? Or act on it?

Steve hears the front door open again. Maybe Grace left her backpack behind? Or they forgot Charlie’s black sports car? Charlie won’t go anywhere without that black sports car. The one he’s told Steve reminds him of the Marquis. It warms Steve’s heart to think that Charlie takes a little piece of him around wherever he goes.

Steve doesn’t trust his shaky legs to stand up, and looks up as the door from the house to the garage opens. It’s Danny. Alone.

“You guys forget something?” Steve asks from the floor, hoping he looks casual and not like the absolute wreck that he is. His legs tented, he rests his elbows as casually as he can manage on his knees.

Danny saunters over to Steve. His walk so full of attitude. Attitude built from a life of being a little shorter than normal and having to prove himself every day.

“Naw, we didn’t forget anything,” Danny says as he crouches down next to Steve. “I wanted to come back in here and check on you without little ears around. You alright?” He taps Steve’s knee with his knuckles.

The concern in Danny’s face makes Steve want to reach out and reassure him. The way his mouth grows small and shifts from side to side, his eyes combing Steve for injuries out of habit. Steve wants to put a hand at the back of Danny’s neck and pull their foreheads together. Speak softly to him and tell him that as long as Danny is around, everything will be alright.

Instead Steve chokes down the emotions with a sad little cough and tries his best to speak from the very bottom of his chest, deep and manly. “Yeah, yeah,” he says, “I’m fine. Just a little out of breath.”

“A little out of breath?” Danny asks. He doesn’t believe it for a second. 

Is this it? The moment when Steve has to confess what’s going on in his head before Danny guesses it or interrogates him until he gives it up? 

“You are not a little out of breath. I have seen you out of breath. It takes, at least, six guys with guns and advanced combat training to get you out of breath my friend. I highly doubt showing off your combat skills against your much less skilled partner put you out of breath. So what’s going on?”

“You should really get the kids home to Rachel,” Steve motions toward the door.

“The kids can wait Steven,” Danny says as he gives up on the crouch, no doubt killing his bad knee, and sits down against the wall next to Steve.

They are close. Wedged right up against each other, two guys who both run too hot rubbing shoulders and hips and knees.

“Now,” Danny continues, always talking. “Are you going to tell me what’s going on? Or are you going to make me guess?”

Steve fumbles for a better reason for him to be shaky on the floor of the garage. Maybe blaming his PTSD is the way to go? The combat moves triggered something for him? But it’s weak, and it’s unfair to use that as an excuse.

“Alright, I’ll guess then,” Danny says, barely giving him thirty seconds to answer first. “It’s Grace right?”

Steve is so startled by the guess that he doesn’t know what to say. Just repeats her name aloud, hoping maybe Danny will elaborate. “Grace,” he breathes out softly.

“Yeah, it’s tough,” Danny continues, like Steve had hoped he would. “She’s growing up too fast right. Knocks the wind out of my sails all the time too. It just takes one look to see that she’s not just a little girl anymore. Most of the time when I’m watching her it’s like she’s still four years old. Then she says, or does something, and she’s not so little anymore. It’s like being punched in the gut.”

Steve is so grateful for an excuse. Anything to avoid talking about his feelings and what he wants. And Danny isn’t wrong. Watching Gracie punching the bag and learning proper form more quickly than he expected had definitely made him nostalgic for her younger years. And all that he had missed before they’d met. Steve just nods, his throat still choked up.

“I tell you what though,” Danny says, filling the air that Steve can’t yet. “Spend too much time focused on that and before you know it you’ll miss out on a bunch more.” He pauses and looks at Steve with those brilliant blue eyes that hurt in the best way every time. “I told the kids we’d stop for lunch before I take them back to Rachel’s. You coming or what?”

“You sure?” Steve asks. “I feel like I’ve stepped on your dad time enough for today.”

“It’s just lunch Steve,” Danny says. “Plus, you’re pretty much taking over the cool dad title from me. Especially after all this boxing stuff. Grace can’t stop talking about it.” The way he says it, sounds like Danny doesn’t even mind that the kids look at Steve like another dad. Steve can’t say he minds either. It’s one of the best compliments he’s ever received.

“Lunch sounds awesome,” Steve says. “Where are we headed?”

“Why don’t you pick,” Danny grins, gets back to his feet and dusts his pants off.

Now Steve just has to figure out a way to put all of his emotions back into the lock box inside him, so his legs won’t shake and he can stand again.

Reading his mind, Danny meets his gaze and holds out a hand to help him up.

Steve grins, places his palm against Danny’s warm reassuring hand and lets himself be pulled up off the floor.


End file.
